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Port operator GT Wilmington USA LLC said the April 6 blockade came in response to a failure to pay $1 million in delinquent port fees by fuel terminal owner Buckeye Partners LP.

On Tuesday, a Delaware judge called the port's blockade a heavy-handed tactic. He also questioned why the port didn't file a lawsuit to resolve the claims over money, instead of attempting to "effectively" shut down Buckeye Partner's business in Delaware.

GT Wilmington, a subsidiary of Emerati-based Gulftainer, has said its actions were within its legal rights, stating the blockade followed months of intermittent negotiations over the unpaid fees originally owed by the fuel storage facility's previous owner, Magellan Terminal Holdings.

Buckeye, which took ownership on March 20, has said GT Wilmington was attempting to extract payments it did not rightly deserve.

The only road that leads to the storage facility goes through the Port of Wilmington.

Buckeye says it possesses an easement across port property so it can get to the dozens of cylindrical towers that hold more than 1.6 million barrels of fuel.

GT Wilmington says it doesn't have an easement.

After examining decades-old deed restrictions and details of Buckeye's lease, Laster said Tuesday that each side has compelling arguments to support its claims.

Yet, what "bugged" him was deciding whether to impose an injunction to determine whether the port could again block access to its property, the judge said.

"Why are we not just agreeing that, until we figure out what the answer is on the money, they can keep using the roads like they've done in the past 12 years?" Laster asked.

"We're fast in Chancery. You're going to get an answer fast," he said to the port's attorneys.

In response, GT WIlmington's attorney Frederick P. Santarelli said the court would "judicially create a property right" for Buckeye, "every day you allow this trespass."

"You got to remember we're talking about property rights to the Port of Wilmington," he said.

By the end of the hearing, Laster extended his previously imposed temporary restraining order, preventing another blockade. He did not indicate whether he would definitively bar the port operator from imposing blockades into the future.

In court documents, Buckeye said it signed in January a purchase agreement for the terminal with then-owner Magellan Terminal Holdings, but was legally prohibited from negotiating a resolution to the million-dollar fee dispute until it took ownership March 20.

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People use the gas pumps at a Wawa location on Concord Pike Wednesday.(Photo: WILLIAM BRETZGER, DELAWARE NEWS JOURNAL)

Buckeye attorney Evan Hofmann conveyed the message to his GT Wilmington contemporary, Gregory Iannarelli, in February, according to court documents.

In its Chancery Court response, GT Wilmington said Hofmann told Iannarelli during the call that Buckeye would not negotiate a resolution to the fees for at least 60 to 90 days after the final purchase, even as fees had been "pending for months with costs accruing."

"The fact that both Magellan and Buckeye effectively foreclosed any resolution of this matter and simply expected GT to sit idly by for at least two to three more months was unacceptable," GT Wilmington attorneys said in court documents.

On April 1, a Port of Wilmington administrator called Wawa executive Brian Schaller and told him the company's tankers would be barred from accessing Buckeye's terminal in five days' time, court documents claim.

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A Dole ship at the port of Wilmington. The use of blockchain technology could have prevented confusion created over a recent lawsuit against the company in Delaware Chancery Court. JENNIFER CORBETT/THE NEWS JOURNA

The Chemours Co.'s former Edge Moor titanium dioxide manufacturing facility is a target for the Port of Wilmington for future expansion on the Delaware River north of Wilmington. The News Journal/JENNIFER CORBET, JENNIFER CORBET/THE NEWS JOURNAL

The Atlantic Titan, a tanker ship, sails north on the Delaware River past the Delaware Memorial Bridge near Edgemoor on Aug. 16. Economic development at the Port of Wilmington has become a campaign issue in the race for New Castle County executive. KYLE GRANTHAM/THE NEWS JOURNAL

Compact Membrane Systems in Newport recently introduced a new product that will filter water out of "environmentally acceptable lubricants" used in large ships like the Dole Colombia, seen here making its way up the Delaware River toward the Delaware Memorial Bridge and Port of Wilmington. KYLE GRANTHAM/THE NEWS JOURNAL

Through a pipeline or on barges, Wawa ships fuel to the terminal from refineries on the Delaware River. When its popular gas stations need additional supplies of gasoline or diesel, its trucks retrieve the fuel from the terminal.

After receiving the warning about the imminent blockade, Schaller immediately emailed Buckeye demanding to know whether the terminal could "with 100% certainty" guarantee that Wawa trucks would get fuel that following Monday.

"Wawa has supply and exchange agreements that are anchored to the truck rack at the Wilmington terminal and our ability to adjust in 48 hours is nil," Schaller said in the email, included in court documents.

The same day the port contacted Schaller, it also began its first communication with Buckeye as the terminal's new owner, the lawsuit said

"The ink was barely dry on the signature pages when Buckeye received its first communication from GT," Buckeye attorneys said.

Contact Karl Baker at kbaker@delawareonline.com or (302) 324-2329. Follow him on Twitter @kbaker6.